Barely 30 years on from the advent of distance learning as we recognise it today, it has already become uncommon for a learner to embark on a programme of education that does not involve frequent access to the Internet; but if a course does not revolve around the Internet, is it in any way inferior and is the learner disadvantaged? Two of the purposes of this paper are to examine two distance learning programmes, one of which involves young offenders serving long sentences, and to explore whether or not learners with restricted Internet access are destined to lose out in an educational setting. In doing so, learner anxiety and organisational anxieties and the implications for pastoral care are also examined.